Instagram Hacks You Need to Grow Your Business
Growing your business’ social media presence can be difficult; it takes time, effort, and often money to grow a huge following on platforms like Instagram. Learn how to grow your Instagram account to promote your business on this popular social network!
Many large companies have dedicated social media teams, focused solely on creating social media content and growing accounts. Not all businesses have those resources, however. No matter how small or large your business is, it’s important to establish a solid presence on social media. Instagram is one of the most popular social networking platforms, especially for younger consumers.
Optimize your Profile Details
The first step to creating a quality Instagram business profile is to check your profile details. Your profile should be optimized so that it is clear what your account represents and what your business is all about. You should also already have your Instagram account set to a business profile, so that you can check out Instagram Insights.
Your name and handle on Instagram should be the name of your business so that you are easy to find and identify. Make your profile picture your business logo for further clarity about who you are. This will make you look more legitimate.
Instagram bios are important: they are the first thing someone reads when they reach your profile, and you only have 150 characters. Write an Instagram bio that clearly presents what your business is all about. Consider including details like your location, industry, or what you provide or sell. If you can share this information while also creating or maintaining a brand voice, even better.
Be sure to include your website’s URL on the option to add a link. This is one of the only places on Instagram where you can create a clickable link, so it shouldn’t be wasted.
Post Relevant, Quality Content
This may seem obvious, but it is vital that you share high-quality content on your business’ Instagram. Only post clearly focused images and videos – no one wants to see blurry or pixelated content.
Not only should your content be high quality in terms of imaging, but it should also be highly relevant to your brand. Sharing a great picture that has nothing to do with your business, industry, or some other factor of your brand is pointless and will only confuse followers.
Think about what your business is all about, in terms of products, services, industry, location, and values. Create content based on those factors, and make sure that anything that you share is on-brand. You can also consider your customers – who they are and what they’d be interested in – and cater your content to them. You can also embed your Instagram content on your own site.
Use the Right Hashtags
Hashtags can help you reach a larger audience online, showing your brand to new potential followers. Using hashtags can significantly grow your following, so long as you’re sharing great content and adding the right hashtags.
Adding any random hashtag to a post will not help your account – it could even hurt it in fact. Before you start hashtagging your posts, research what hashtags are right for your business. Look for hashtags based on your industry and location, and check out what hashtags your competitors are using.
Studies have shown that the optimal number of hashtags for engagement is 11. Try to use a range of broad to specific hashtags, and both larger and smaller ones in terms of a number of posts. Using all big hashtags may seem better to help you reach a larger audience, but there is more competition for attention on those pages.
Using the right hashtags well can help your post end up on Instagram explore pages, or among the top posts for that hashtag. Find the best hashtags for your business and apply them to help your posts reach a larger audience and bring new followers to your account.
When you know your most important hashtag, set up monitoring to get notified when someone contributes a popular update to that hashtag. This site allows you to set up that kind of monitoring: Make sure you engage with those popular posts from your business’s behalf. It will also help you understand what type of content becomes popular in your industry:
Follow and Engage
If you want to get more Instagram followers, you’ll have to follow others. By targeting specific Instagram users, you can grow followers and improve engagement.
Think about it: if someone new follows you on Instagram, you’ll likely click their account to see who it is, and possibly follow back. Follow back rates vary, and not everyone will follow back if you follow them. By targeting Instagram users who are likely to be interested in your business or content, however, you can expect more people to follow your account back.
This method will help you grow Instagram followers and can help with engagement. If you follow and engage with your followers, they are more likely to engage back, liking and commenting on your pictures. Building a loyal base of followers through this method can also help your business grow offline, as some of these followers may end up becoming customers.
To further engage with followers, ask for their feedback in captions or directly through a DM. Ask what they want to see from your brand, what they like or dislike about your products, and more. This makes customers and followers feel heard and appreciated, and will only help to improve your business on Instagram and beyond.
Run a Contest
Instagram challenges and contests can significantly help grow your business. Contests can be whatever you want, but they typically involve asking followers to share an image and tag your brand or use a branded hashtag to enter for a chance to win prizes. Prizes can range from free products to discounts, or you can simply offer the chance to be reposted onto your account.
Running a contest on Instagram helps your business in a few ways. First, it helps you further engage with followers and customers. Second, it gets your brand more exposure, as those followers will share a post about your brand, which their followers can see. This will hopefully attract new followers to your profile.
Contests can also help you find user-generated content. If you encourage followers to share a post or Instagram story of them wearing, using, or showing off your products, you can easily compile user-generated content to post later. This, again, helps improve engagement and makes it easy to find pictures to post.
Grow your Instagram Following
Try out these Instagram hacks to grow your business online! Focus on creating great content and engaging with your followers, and by following these best practices your account will grow in no time